You are here

Emerson named November recipient of Diversity Spotlight award

The athletics department is supporting the college’s second annual Transgender Awareness Week

November 4, 2014 9:13amJack Copeland

A program to promote transgender awareness at Emerson College is being recognized this month in the NCAA Division III Diversity Spotlight initiative.

The Diversity Spotlight recognizes and promotes outstanding diversity-related projects, programming and initiatives that are occurring on Division III campuses and in conference offices. All award recipients receive $500 towards their next diversity initiative.

The athletics department at Emerson has partnered with the college’s Department of Diversity and Inclusion to organize the second annual Transgender Awareness Week November 3-6. National Transgender Awareness Week is a week-long celebration in November dedicated to education, advocacy and discussion of issues that face the transgender community. Emerson has planned a series of workshops, presentations, artistic performances and group discussions to bring awareness and understanding to the issue.

For two consecutive years, the Princeton Review has rated Emerson as the most LGBT-friendly college campus in the country. As co-sponsors of the program, the Emerson athletics department not only has contributed financially to secure high-profile and influential speakers, but it also has played a critical role in organizing and planning the week’s events. This year’s programming brings together a variety of speakers ranging from advocacy lawyers, spoken-word poets and a body image/wellness consultant to a national journalist and education advocate.

The speakers include keynote speaker Kylar Brodas, senior policy council member who runs the Transgender Civil Rights Project at the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force in Washington, D.C.; poet Tucker Garcia, a former NCAA women’s soccer and lacrosse athlete; Justice Williams, executive director of BodyImage4Justice, a Boston-area organization that engages the larger LGBTQ community on issues affecting the transgender community by focusing on common concerns around body image, health and wellness; and Tiq Milan, senior media strategist of national news at GLAAD and co-chair for the LGBT task force of the National Association of Black Journalists, and Kim Milan, co-founder and executive director of The People Project.

Recognizing the importance that these events can have in the lives of the students, Emerson and its athletic department has assembled an “all-star cast” for the Transgender Awareness Week, in hopes of continuing to create a more inclusive environment that promotes success for Emerson students.